William M. Rainach

William Monroe Rainach Jr. (13 July 1913-26 January 1978) was a Louisiana Democratic state representative from 1940 to 1948 and a state senator from 1948 to 1960.

Biography
William Odom was born in Kentwood, Tangipahoa Parish, Louisiana in 1913, and he was placed in a Baptist orphanage at Lake Charles after his mother died in 1917. He was fostered by the Rainach family of Summerfield in Claiborne Parish, and he came to work in the energy industry before serving in the State House from 1940 to 1948 and in the State Senate from 1948 to 1960. In 1954, he successfully passed the state's first right-to-work law, but it was repealed two years later. During the second half of the 1950s, he led the state's "Massive Resistance" to desegregation, and he founded White Councils as the white counterparts to the NAACP and purged 30,000 African-Americans from voter rolls due to their "inability to interpret the US Constitution". Governor Earl Long later scolded Rainach for his segregationist policies, and he failed in his own gubernatorial bid in 1959. In 1960, he failed in his run to become an unpledged presidential elector, and he shot himself in 1978 after falling sick.